Shuffle
by Zero's Wings
Summary: Trowa fic. From his past, Trowa recalls Catherine reading his fortune with a Tarot deck. The session sheds insight onto the other G-boys, the war, operation meteor, and a coming battle. Read my other fics, 'The Awakening' and 'Disconnect' first. R&R!!!
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I own the pine scented air-freshener that hung from Wing Zero's dashboard

Shuffle – Part 1

By Zero's Wings

Trowa sat in the cockpit of a modified Leo, his body as rigid as a stone gargoyle. He heard other members of his mercenary group taking out pillboxes on the north ridge. He would wait for the proper time to begin his part in the attack. Trowa clutched the crude wooden cross around his neck not in fear or in prayer, but as if that tiny object alone held his body steady. He released it, feeling calm and sturdy again. His body then became deeply rigid and tense, his face hardened into an impenetrable mask. It was as if he were some plant that had roots in a state of massive overgrowth, reaching deep into the core of this world and all the souls who inhabited it. He was planted in the deep, aortic vein of humanity. He felt enlightened; he was at peace.

__

I am not Trowa. I am a nameless soldier who has been on the battlefield from as far back as I can remember.

*****

The circus tent was alive with activity. Jugglers, lion tamers, trapeze artists; they all rushed hurriedly through the dressing rooms and the circus ring. The manager, in his huge red coat with dangling coattails, directed the entire mess of color and light with the neurotic, forceful urgency of an orchestra conductor. 

Catherine turned the card deck over with her delicate, nimble fingers. The cards played musical chairs and dropped into their seats, forming a perfect stack. Trowa was transfixed on those hands; they worked so artfully, so gently. Those same hands were trained to throw deadly knives and handle vicious lions. It seemed oddly contradictory, then, that her hands should be so exquisitely soft and dainty.

Trowa's eyes wandered from Catherine's hands to the cards that were being shifted, and he saw that they were heavily decorated and had strange pictures on them. They were unlike the cards that the mercenaries used when they played poker, and Trowa doubted that Catherine would interrupt his preparation for tonight's act only to play a round of five-card stud.

"What kind of cards are those?" Trowa asked quietly.

"They're tarot cards. I've been practicing with them for a while, and I think I just figured out all the combinations."

"Listen, Catherine," he said in a clipped, slightly annoyed voice, "why don't you just save your little card game until after tonight's show?" She looked slightly hurt.

"This isn't just some little card game, Trowa. With these cards, I can tell you all about your life, and your future."

"I don't believe in predestination."

"That's okay," she said with a wink and a big smile, "I'll believe in it for you." Realizing that she was on a roll and there was no stopping her at this point, he simply crossed his arms impatiently and waited.

"This is a colony standard deck. The original tarot system was lost about two hundred years ago, around the time of man's colonization of space. Earth and the colonies both recreated the tarot card system, but they use different standards. The colony standard is better, of course." Trowa smiled a bit. Catherine knew her stuff, and she really seemed to be enjoying this. Besides, he was almost prepared for tonight's show anyway.

"I'm going to draw seven cards," she explained, "two will be from the Major Arcana, and the other five will be cards with common suits. There are four suits and eight characters. Cups, Wands, Swords, and Pentacles are the suits, and Princess, Prince, Son, Daughter, Knight, Page, King and Queen are the characters. These cards will tell us about your future relationships. The Major Arcana cards are placed in the middle, and the other five form a circle around them." She shuffled the deck and drew the first card. Trowa was surprised to find himself rather anxious in his anticipation.

The card was dark, colored with deep blue and black hues, with a single, pallid sphere in the center. Under it was a caption that simply read: ~ The Moon ~

"This must be you, Trowa." Catherine's eyes were in a trance-like state. They shown through swimming glass, like a frozen lake melting in springtime.

"The moon represents hidden thoughts. Analytical clockwork turning in your head. You say more in silence than in words, and you keep the best of yourself to yourself. Cold and dead outwardly, your inner warmth is supported by a great strength."

"That's interesting," Trowa said. He had never thought that he was hiding anything from anyone, especially not his own sister. He wasn't withholding any thoughts, he was too busy observing. Yes, that was it, he was an observer. He never formed conclusions about what he had seen, as he reasoned, _if the god that created this existence does not have enough understanding of it to give it structure and order, than why should anyone expect me to reach an understanding about the nature of this existence?_

The next card she drew was alive with inviting reds and whites, but this one carried a foreboding message in its illustration.

"This is the second Major Arcana, Trowa. The other person in your life who will have the most impact upon you."

The card grimly told him: ~ The Hanged Man ~

End of part 1

Author's Note: Yeah, I know it's short, but more is on the way. I'll be starting the main arc that ties all of my previous stories together very soon, so keep your eyes peeled! Until then, feel free to email me and tell me what you think of my stuff, good or bad! I love feedback!

Email Me!

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	2. Chapter 2

Shuffle-part2

Disclaimer: If it looks at all familiar, it doesn't belong to me. I'm not making money off this(duh), I'm just another loser who loves Gundam Wing. Anyway, enough with the self-deprecation, on to the good stuff. Read and review, please!!

Shuffle-part2

By Zero's Wings

As soon as Catherine had dropped the foreboding card onto the table, their manager, always excitable and now visibly flustered, barged into their room.

"What are you two doing?!!" he demanded. "You're both on in less than five minutes!"

"We'll have to save this for later, Trowa." Catherine placed the Hanged Man card next to The Moon, Trowa's waxen alter ego.

It was an eventful night. Trowa performed in Catherine's knife-throwing routine and with the lions. All of the events were melded into one nauseating kaleidoscope of deafening noise and vociferous hue in his mind. He was still haunted by the frank portrait that he had received through that tarot card. He couldn't believe that he was treating the whole load of nonsense with such seriousness and reverence. Trowa couldn't stop himself from thinking that he was a deceitful little keeper of secrets. He wanted no secrets kept from his beloved sister. She was all that he had now. Indeed, all that he ever had, his parents left this world before he could even appreciate their presence.

__

They're just cards, he repeated in his mind. _But if they're just cards, why have I become so self-defensive of that fact? _He was barely conscious of the blade, which dared closer to his temple than any other in recent memory. And the lion's teeth, which had nearly caught him, left no impact either.

__

And what does this second card mean? he wondered. Is it a harbinger of my own death? Catherine said it is the person who will have a major impact on my life, other than myself. Will this person kill himself? Or will he persuade me to do so? Trowa doubted both. He believed that suicide, unless committed by a mentally ill person, or for a certain cause that was greater than his individual self-worth, was one of the greatest signs of weakness and cowardice. He did not believe that he would befriend or associate with someone who planned on killing themselves. He also believed that he would never kill himself, unless he found a belief or a movement that was truly worth giving up his own life for, and he was called upon to do so.

*****

The only way to live a good life is to act on your emotions

*****

Never give up until the end *****

When the siblings finally returned to their cards, Trowa was, much to his own surprise, brimming with excitement. He flopped down heavily in his chair, but the performance hadn't tired him at all. He was barely aware that it had happened. It was the anticipation that had worn him down.

Catherine sat down in front of Trowa and flashed quick smile in his direction. She studied the second card that had been placed on the table.

"What does it mean, Catherine?"

She eyed the card suspiciously and then fell into a trance again.

"The Hanged Man is a symbol of strength and death. It is a restless, unconquerable spirit. A tragic figure."

Trowa almost shuddered. The man, hanging from his noose like an unposed question caught on the end of one's lip, was vaguely disturbing and familiar. The eyes of the hanged man called out to him, but an inner coldness had silenced his cries.

Catherine then drew five more cards and placed them, face down, on the table in a circle around the moon and the hanged man. Each was an independent satellite that revolved around Trowa's secretive figure and this unknown's grim representation.

Trowa's sister turned over each card one by one. The first was a troubled young boy, with blond hair and adorned with luxuries, clutching a heart shaped symbol surrounded by gold flames, and with a single tear precariously dangling from his eyelashes.

"The Son of Cups. He is a known by all to be pleasant, calm, reticent, and shy. However, he has a tragic inner motif and an unusual gift for interpreting emotions and symbols. He cares deeply about a few people of certain causes, and is highly idealistic. His mind has a tendency to be lyrical as opposed to logical. At times he will make errors of fact, but never of values. He will be a good friend, the closest you'll have." Trowa nodded. He could imagine befriending such a person later in life.

*****

Open your eyes, Trowa! The person you have to protect lives there! You were the one who corrected the mistake that I made. I can't let you make that same mistake!

*****

We shouldn't fight each other. It isn't right.

*****

The next card was turned.

Two nude figures embracing one another. 

"The Lovers," Catherine said simply.

"Where does that card go?" Trowa asked anxiously.

"That is not for us to know. The future is not written in stone. We are only to know that there will be love." She winked at Trowa and grinned.

"I noticed that card doesn't apply to the suits or characters." Trowa said. "Is it another Major Arcana? I thought there were only to be two of those cards."

"Actually it belongs to the Minor Arcana, which is invariably mixed in with the standard cards. The Minor Arcana forms a bridge between to suit cards. It's a complicated system, and I didn't want to confuse you from the start."

"It makes no difference," Trowa said darkly. Catherine shrugged and turned over the fifth card. It had ribbons of color streaming over it, pinks and blues and whites mixing together, and a maiden in the center.

"The Princess of Cups, a loving, imaginative humanizer. She is thought of amongst her friends as a cooperative, charismatic, strong-willed woman. She is always caring and concerned, and idealizes her personal relationships. If nothing else, she is constantly empathetic and understanding of the emotions and motivations of others."

*****

Peace is not something that is given to you. Each person must strive for their own sense of resolution and justice.

*****

Earth is becoming unified. Is that girl behind it?

*****

Catherine's eyes brightened. "I see! These two cards," she began as she drew together the Son of Cups and the Princess of Cups, "are both connected with the lovers card."

"Those two are in love?" Trowa said.

"No, I believe that the Minor Arcana links the two of them to your card and the Hanged Man card."

"So the Son and Princess of Cups are the lovers of myself and the suicidal fellow respectively."

"Right," she giggled. That sound reminded Trowa of just how young and innocent his sister was. She couldn't possibly be expected to understand the events going on around her. Trowa knew that there was a movement within the colonies to take revenge for Heero Yuy's death. If the colonies sent weapons to earth, war and massacre would be inevitable. And what was this secret society that the mercenary group he fought with kept referring to? What was its name, OZ, something like that? It was hard to tell with their cockney or often guttural accents, which were a stew-like concoction of many Northern European ways of speaking combined. They whispered about this organization with growing fear yet little concrete knowledge. All of it was a constant, troubling splinter that refused to be dislodged from the back of Trowa's mind.

The sixth card, a frightening, soulless doll suspended on marionette strings, grasped by a great, shadow covered hand, and a tall, dark figure in the background, watching over its insensate slave with greedy slits for eyes. Inscribed upon it was ~ The Puppet ~ 

"There will be a great conflict. It will be resolved when this figure is banished." Catherine said all of this with her eyes closed and her head tilted back in her trance. It was as though she were in some far off place, blinded by the light of such revelations, and had to transmit the message back to Trowa while blind and alone. She opened her eyes and brought her head forward. 

Catherine turned the disturbing puppet card over. She drew a second card and placed it on top of the former, covering it completely. This card was a bright and beautiful sunrise; it seemed to sing with joyous energy. It could not have been any more appropriately titled: ~ Life ~

"A lucky draw," she said, obviously relieved. There will be a great conflict in your future, and the controlled puppet figure will be the final rush, the crescendo that punctuates this conflict. But you and the others," she said while gesturing to all the other cards that she had drawn, "will survive."

"One to go," Trowa said. He was now as entranced by the prospect of his future revealed through these cards as Catherine was from the start.

The final card was turned.

Catherine saw it and almost let out a cry of some shrill variety. The card was predominantly gray and black. It had a huge, towering cloud drawn on it. There were twists of white lighting coming out of its bloated underside, and above, the cumulonimbus was stacked so high with the dark puff-like matter that it seemed ready to topple over as it floated ominously above a barren plain. Of course, it was labeled ~ The Storm ~

For a brief moment Trowa thought that he had simply imagined the roll of thunder in the distance as he eyed the card's vivid illustration. He was quite startled when he heard the thick raindrops begin to land on the canvas of their circus tent. It snapped him back into reality, and his gaze shifted up from the tarot card to his sister's distressed face.

"I guess I was to early in calling that last card a lucky draw. This one is much worse." Catherine brow folded upon itself a countless number of times.

"Don't do that," Trowa said in a rare, kind voice. He reached up with two fingers and brushed strands of hair away from her furrowed brow. "You'll get wrinkles." He smiled at her and his green eyes lit with warmth, transforming themselves from cold, green marble to an emerald hearth.

"It's just-" she began, uncertain, "this card is, to put it frankly, a harbinger of doom."

"That doesn't sound good," Trowa said, only half-serious now. Catherine ignored him and went right on ahead.

"It is a sign of coming darkness, of tragedy or great loss, for all of you!" she yelled suddenly, and made a great sweeping motion over all the cards on the table. She then fell back into her seat and cried into the palms of her hands.

"There, there," Trowa said, trying to comfort her. "They're just cards. Don't worry about me. I'll be fine. I'm not going anywhere, not as long as the Barton Foundation is still looking for their missing heir."

She dried her tears and pushed all the cards from the carefully constructed ideogram into a big, confused pile.

"Stupid cards," she sniffled.

The two siblings sat in silence for a while, and then Trowa got up from his seat and made some coffee for the two of them. They drank their coffee slowly from steaming mugs, keeping their eyes on each other but saying nothing. The rain beat down upon their circus tent more furiously then ever, and it was especially noticeable in their silence. When Trowa got up to make a second cup for himself, there was a loud beeping noise. It was his computer, squawking to alert him of an incoming message. He opened up the laptop and hit a few keys. Its artificial blue light flashed soundlessly and filled the room.

Trowa sat down in front of the computer and began typing. After he entered his password to receive the sensitive documents that had just been transmitted, he opened the file with a couple nervous clicks on his track button pad.

Glowing blue text scrolled down in front of his eyes. "Top Priority…Operation M…Weapons Development" Trowa sped through the vast load of information, his heart gripped with a vile feeling of dread. This was the message that he hoped he would never see. The suit, Heavyarms, had been completed. Preparations were set at the LaGrange point and strategic locations all over Earth and the Colonies. This was his call back to the front.

Trowa stood up. His face masked all of his emotions beneath an impenetrable wall of stony skin and rigid muscle. Catherine knew that mask well, and she stood up, gave a quick, little shriek, and dropped her coffee mug. It shattered on the floor with a light tinkling sound. Catherine knew as soon as she saw her brother's face that he would be leaving again. And that cold, deadly look told her he was not simply going out on another routine mission with that band of mercenaries.

Leaving Cathy, and this place, felt to Trowa as though he had just plunged an icicle into his heart. It was horrible. He had no idea what to say, and as he approached her, no words came. With nothing else in reserve, he placed his hands on her shoulders and gingerly kissed her forehead.

"Goodbye."

As big, sparkling tears welled up in his sister's eyes, Trowa could take it no longer. He turned away from her and walked out of the tent into the rainy night. He knew that if he did not leave then, he would never be able to leave her again. Trowa tried with all his might to drive her from his mind, and the effort brought tears to his own eyes. Feeling fortunate that he was walking in a rainstorm, he let the tears roll down his face and he wept openly. His life, his identity, his mind; all were in a constant state of upheaval, and he suppposed they always would be, for a nameless wanderer like him. He gathered up the elements of his life and concentrated them into the confines of his skull. And from there, he shuffled them endlessly on.

End


	3. Final Interlude

~ Final Interlude ~ ****

Author's Note: Sorry this one took so long. I've been busy with school. My standard disclaimer applies. There's also some strong language. Enjoy. 

****

~ Final Interlude ~

Trowa's story was interrupted by a horrible screaming coming from upstairs.

Duo was lying on his bed, clutching his side and coughing. There was a horrible taste in his throat; it felt like he had swallowed a wad of pennies, and they were now halfway to being regurgitated in a burning, liquid form. The screaming had left his throat and now there was only blood to fill it. Blood filled his wound as well, soaking down into his bed sheets and dripping on the carpet with a rhythmic spattering sound. Duo saw large, dark shapes moving in front of the light in his eyes, but he could not identify them.

Quatre ran into Duo's room, the source of the screaming, and was initially shocked by the sheer amount of blood. It seemed impossible that one person could have so much liquid in him. It coated the bed, soaked the rug, and sprayed in a radial pattern on the far wall. He was surprised by the smell of blood too; it was not like any natural odor. It smelled like fumes from a steel mill. It was an acrid, metallurgic scent.

Duo saw one of the shapes rush past him quickly, toward the light coming from his bathroom. He heard Quatre vomiting. He felt sorry for the little guy. Quatre had been through a lot during the war, but it had never been this close, or this personal. Before it was all cold, calculated, mobile suit battles. But now, just when everyone was settling back into a complacent time of peace, something like this had to happen. Duo gripped his free hand into a fist and loosed a chain of curses in his head.

Heero felt a strange sense return to him, a kind of thirst or fire that inspired heightened awareness and energy to well up inside him. The taste of blood in the air, infecting the water in his eyes and receptors on his tongue, was driving him mad. He felt as though he had just awoken to the symptoms of a man deep in drug withdrawal. The back of his hands and neck itched.

Heero regarded the scene for a few silent moments, then walked over to the bedside. He tore away some of the sheets that had been soaked through with blood. Heero applied pressure to the wound in Duo's side with his bare hands. He then turned to Trowa.

"Get the black bag from the top shelf in my closet. It has some of my medical supplies." He thought for a moment, then added, "And wake up Wufei, too."

"That won't be necessary," the Chinese pilot said groggily. He was standing in the doorway, half-awake and wearing a white, silk nightgown. He rubbed his eyes and stretched his neck back and forward with a few light pops.

Trowa returned quickly with the bag. Heero opened it and pulled out several jars. They contained scalpels bathed in green, liquid disinfectant. He continued to empty the bag, bringing out a parade of bandages, sutures, an array of powerful pharmaceuticals, and even IV and colostomy bags.

Heero placed two towels around Duo's wound and used a third to wipe away the blood. He looked at the flickering bulb hanging over the room disdainfully.

"I need more light."

Wufei, in an unexpected moment of creativity, carried in the teak dresser from his room. A Buddhist shrine rested on top of it. There was already some incense burning in it, and he took a Zippo lighter from Duo's bedside table and lit a series of tea lights and a butter lamp at the center of the shrine. It smelled horrible, but it lit up the room quite effectively.

A powerful orange glow overtook Duo's vision. After a moment of complete blindness, he could now see better than he had since he had been shot. His first sight was an unnerving one. Heero's hands, in latex gloves, holding a pair of extremely sharp implements.

"Hey buddy," Duo said nervously, "what are you planning on doing with those?"

Heero ignored him. After wiping the wound clean a second time, Heero proceeded to make the first cut.

Duo let out an incredible, high-pitched shriek. He twisted around in the bed, yelling like a maddened banshee.

"What the fuck are you doing?" Duo screamed, almost delirious with pain. "You're supposed to give me anesthesia first, you asshole!"

"You'll pass out in a few seconds," Heero said calmly. Duo came up and angrily gripped the collar of Heero's shirt and pulled him close.

"You know, in all the time I've known you," Duo began fiercely, "you've never ceased to be one cold prick." He had just barely finished his sentence when his eyes rolled back in his head like slots, revealing milky, blank spaces. Duo dropped straight back into his bed like a tree falling in a forest, and his forceful landing caused the mattress springs to creak.

*****

"Ow!" Duo said, suddenly awakened by a burning pain in his side. 'What the hell was that?"

"Hyfrecator," Heero answered quickly, "it cauterizes the wound."

"You had a Hyfrecator in your little first aid kit?" Duo asked in surprise.

"No, it's actually a small welding flame for circuit panels on my Gundam."

"Hey, you didn't put any of Zero's spare parts in me while you were at it, right?" Duo smiled a bit. Heero looked up from his stitching work with a deadly serious glare.

"No."

"I was kidding," Duo said in exasperation. "That was a joke if you've ever heard one." Heero grumbled and finished stitching up the wound. Duo looked at his freshly sewed-up wound. The stitches weren't visible from his vantage point. They were covered by folds of skin. It just looked like he had grown a second bellybutton in his side overnight. He also noticed that he was numb from his actual bellybutton up to his neck. _So Heero did give me some anesthesia,_ he thought. He saw the stoic pilot pack up his medical kit alone and head for the door.

"Hey, Heero!" Duo called. The young surgeon stopped in his tracks and turned his head slightly. Duo felt relieved and comforted seeing those intense, deep blue eyes. "Thanks for saving my life," Duo sputtered awkwardly.

"I didn't. Whoever shot you had pretty bad aim. He actually just hit the wall next to you. A ricocheting bullet fragment caught you. None of your organs were perforated, and your blood vessels were all left perfectly intact. You would've been fine anyway." Heero tossed Duo a small lump of metal. Duo caught the object sluggishly. He opened up his hand and stared at the source of all his pain.

"This? This little thing?" Duo said in disbelief. "It felt like fire from hell itself. It was awful."

"Do you have any idea who shot you?" Heero asked with genuine curiosity. Duo shook his head.

"It was too dark to see his face, but I didn't recognize his voice. He was tall, white, kinda skinny. Didn't look like he was military." Heero shrugged, then turned to leave. Duo stopped him once again. "Hey, I almost forgot. He wasn't here for me. He was looking for you, Heero."

Heero blinked. His face remained unchanged.

"Forget about it," Heero said in a rare, soothing voice. You'll be fine, and so will I."

"Oh, I almost forgot!" Duo said, sitting up suddenly. "I think he came in a mobile suit. It was a new model, and it looked really advanced. And it was even bigger than Zero."

"You were dreaming," Heero said confidently, "or you aren't remembering clearly. It's illegal to build mobile suit factories, remember? Besides, all the factories are gone, and with them, the last reserves of Gundanium and Neo-Titanium. There couldn't have been a mobile suit out there. It's impossible."

"Maybe this one was built before the war," Duo argued. "I saw it, I'm sure I did. It was right outside my window."

Heero scratched his head, then walked over and pulled back the venetian blind.

"Look, if the mobile suit was as large as you say, it wouldn't have any place to land. It would either hit a bunch of palm trees or the plow into this house. As you can see, it did neither. You were imagining it."

"I know what I saw," Duo said confidently.

"Get some rest, Duo." Heero pulled the blind back down and walked out of the room without another word.

End of Final Interlude

Author's Note: Up next is the main arc of this whole story, a lengthy fic entitled "Skeletons In the Closet." It may be awhile before it comes out in full, I'm back in school and am very busy these days.


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